Website Creation Software?

Pennywise

I'm looking for recommendations of an easy to use software package for writing a website. I've had a website for many years, originally written in Word, but then in frontpage express and more latterly in frontpage, but I want something a little better now.

It is a website for a professional consulting practice, with the usual "about us" etc but also with quite a library of technical fact sheets. It is regularly updated and over a couple of years, most of the fact sheets will be changed or deleted with new ones added. Some factsheets are PDFs and others are simple HTML pages.

I don't need fancy graphics, animations, etc in the pages themselves., but I would like a more modern "feel" in the home page, navigation pages, etc., so I'd like something with a lot of templates for the site design/infrastructure that won't change, but also with an easy to use content management system so that I can change the factsheets etc often and easily.

I don't want a "blog" and I am happy with my website hosts, I feel that I've moved beyond the simple site creation tools and would like something like Frontpage, but perhaps something that actually works properly and is easier to use. I understand basic html, can easily do hyperlinks, anchors, etc., but don't need anything for the expert and don't want to learn new programming languages, java, or anything like this.

Has anyone any ideas of products that could meet my criteria? I'm not looking for anything free of charge - I'm happy to pay a reasonable amount, (but not thousands).

elvch01

I use Adobe Dreamweaver - might be a bit more than you want/need both in tersm of functionality & price

[Deleted User]

Take a look at this list of HTML editors on Wikipedia to see if you gel with any of the ones that are available for free, because Dreamweaver can work out quite expensive especially if you're not going to be using it to it's fullest. From that list, KompoZer is quite frequently mentioned to be a good product.

[Deleted User]

Just a tip for when you release your new website - Make sure all the old links point to somewhere on the new site. Nothing worse when trying to visit a bookmark to a page/file on a website only to find the site has been re-launched and all the old links are not found! :mad:

damo24

Dreamweaver is pretty much the ultimate web design program but it is very expensive and is more likely overkill for what you want to do. If you're looking for a WYSIWYG program Kompozer (http://kompozer.net/) is one of the best free ones out there.

It is nearly always preferable to build any website by code, as you can already code in HTML why not have a look at W3 Schools (http://www.w3schools.com/) who have some excellent guides.

fuzzball172

This is probably going to get me shot down in flames, but seeing as it is for a professional consulting company, have you considered using a professional web designer? for less than the price of dreamweaver you could have a quality site built in a lot less time than it would take you to learn how to do it yourself. Sometimes it can be cheaper in the long run to hire a professional to do a job for you and you will end up with a more professional image for your business.
Other than that then dreamweaver is the mutts nuts as far as packages goes, but a halfway decent package is CoffeeCup HTML editor 2008 which costs about $45 i think

Pennywise

fuzzball172 wrote: »

This is probably going to get me shot down in flames, but seeing as it is for a professional consulting company, have you considered using a professional web designer? for less than the price of dreamweaver you could have a quality site built in a lot less time than it would take you to learn how to do it yourself. Sometimes it can be cheaper in the long run to hire a professional to do a job for you and you will end up with a more professional image for your business.
Other than that then dreamweaver is the mutts nuts as far as packages goes, but a halfway decent package is CoffeeCup HTML editor 2008 which costs about $45 i think

The problem (?) is that I need to regulary update the content of the site, almost all technical pages having to be changed at least annually, and many pages changing every few weeks/months. I got quotes from several web designers and for a one-off fixed website with occasional changes, yes the prices were affordable, but for something they were to write that gave me any form of content management system to allow me to edit/add/delete pages, all the quotes were several thousand pounds, which is why I've been doing it myself.

bigmacca81625

regular content update, good way to build the site, the design would have to be done elsewhere though, it sounds like you need joomla, or if you can cope with it, wordpress.

wordpress have thousands of free themes on the net, im sure you'll also get some free themese for joomla, there easy to use both of them

faevilangel

why not ask them to build a theme for an open source cms, instead of creating a custom one!

A wordpress theme can be had from £200 and its easily updateable by you! Wordpress can be turned into a CMS with ease

Or you have hundreds of cms' such as expression engine, joomla, drupal, eocms, dotnetnuke

You can update the site and all they would have done is made the site look like you want

All the open source cms' have mods / free themes if you need, that you can modify

M4RKM

Pennywise wrote: »

The problem (?) is that I need to regulary update the content of the site, almost all technical pages having to be changed at least annually, and many pages changing every few weeks/months. I got quotes from several web designers and for a one-off fixed website with occasional changes, yes the prices were affordable, but for something they were to write that gave me any form of content management system to allow me to edit/add/delete pages, all the quotes were several thousand pounds, which is why I've been doing it myself.

haha.. i love proper web design companies.. anything with a CMS even for 1 page, and the price shoots up..

I'd probably quote about £800 for a site like that... however, wordpress would do the trick as well as already said..


M